Yarmouth, Barnstable drug busts result of cooperation

Monday

Aug 25, 2014 at 7:00 AM

Investigations take time, patience, luck.

Conor Powers-Smith csmith@wickedlocal.com

YARMOUTH - As heroin use has risen sharply across Massachusetts in recent years, bringing with it increases in addiction, overdoses and drug-related theft, police departments throughout the state have been hard-pressed to control the countless small-scale criminal enterprises that have sprung up as consequences of the growing demand.

No exception to the trend, police on Cape Cod have had to work harder and smarter in their efforts to take as much heroin as possible off the streets.

“Heroin is really on our number-one watch list,” said Detective Scott Lundegren, a member of the Yarmouth Police Department’s Drug Enforcement Unit.

Since joining the force about a decade ago, Lundegren has seen the drug of choice on the Cape shift from opioid painkillers like codeine, fentanyl, and oxycodone, to heroin, a more powerful and dangerous member of the same chemical family. The chance has been in part due to well-meaning legislation meant to curb the abuse of prescription drugs. “As the laws changed regarding pills and their formulation and availability, we saw that demand change from the pills—because there was no availability—to the heroin.”

While medications carry their own risks—sometimes serving as the origin of addiction, even when legitimately prescribed—heroin represents another level of danger. “The problem of heroin is there’s no assurance of quality,” said Lundegren. Unlike prescription medication, heroin might contain any of a long list of foreign substances capable of killing the user, quite apart from the drug itself. “We’ve seen people overdose because of unknown chemicals.”

Heroin’s highly addictive nature makes it just as capable of killing slowly. “This is an awful, awful drug,” said Lundegren. “This is like giving people cancer, and selling chemotherapy at $50 a bag.”

The rising demand has pushed supply up as well. The more prevalent heroin becomes, the more tempted kids may be to try it. “We are certainly seeing people at a younger age experimenting with it,” Lundegren said. Addiction can begin almost immediately, and, once the trap is sprung, escape can be next to impossible; heroin is not the “take it or leave it” high kids may expect, Lundegren said. “There’s no leaving it with heroin.”

Cooperative approach

In combating heroin use, police departments across the Cape routinely work in concert. “We really have a very cooperative effort throughout Cape Cod,” said Lundegren. “We work almost on a daily basis together.” An investigation that begins in one town may spill over into one or more neighboring communities.

“We see a lot of people who are in Hyannis, conducting drug business, but then they’re living in Yarmouth,” Lundegren said. Cooperation is so ingrained that significant arrests of drug dealers are rarely conducted by just one department. “Barnstable and Yarmouth work almost hand in hand in these drug cases,” said Lundegren. “We don’t see much of a town line.”

The June arrest of Nicolo Billingsley in an apartment above the Embargo restaurant and nightclub on Main Street in Hyannis was a perfect example of the rewards of cooperation. Billingsley had been under watch by Yarmouth police while living in that town, and the investigation continued unabated when he relocated to Hyannis, with information flowing freely in both directions. When police finally searched the apartment, they found 120 grams of heroin — with an estimated street value of $30,000 — along with other indications that Billingsley was operating a thriving trade.

That investigation lasted months, not an uncommon occurrence. Police often log hours of surveillance before finally making an arrest. Drug purchases by undercover officers, which also formed an important part of the Billingsley investigation, are more rare; officers capable of pulling off such deceptions are highly prized, and rigorously trained. “I think it takes a lot of skill, and a lot of nerve,” said Lundegren. “They’re extremely convincing.”

Billingsley was under scrutiny from police because of a long history with drugs, including a 2013 conviction for possession of heroin with intent to distribute for which he was released early, in the wake of the state drug lab scandal that saw thousands of tests invalidated due to improper practices by chemist Annie Dookhan; the legacy of that incident persists, with police having to retain drug samples indefinitely in case additional testing is necessary.

But many investigations begin under less obvious circumstances, with a tip from someone at the periphery of the drug community. “Everybody has some level of source out there,” said Lundegren. “We’re sort of in the intelligence-gathering business.”

Seemingly disconnected facts and suppositions can suddenly combine to tell a story. “We’re weighing these new things that come in against things we already know,” Lundegren said. “It’s sort of a giant puzzle. We’re always searching for the missing pieces.”

There are no substitutes for experience and local knowledge. “We start to see these patterns,” Lundegren said. “You’re spotting the names, or you’re spotting trends, or the places, or the habits. It all starts to mean something.”

Distribution networks targeted

In pursuit of patterns, police attempt to trace drug distribution networks as high as possible. “We’re always trying to go up the ladder,” Lundegren said. That includes attempting to get information from street-level dealers with the enticement of shortened sentences, a tactic that does not succeed as often as it does on television or film.

“Unfortunately, it’s not usual that the suspects want to cooperate,” said Lundegren. “There are some people who are looking for special consideration, but that’s sort of hard to come by.” And those nearer the top are usually there for a reason. “The higher you go up the chain, the more savvy they become, the more aware of the consequences of their actions.”

Police pursue investigations wherever they lead; bridges are no more barriers than town lines. “A lot of the drugs that we see that come to Cape Cod obviously come from outside sources,” said Lundegren, naming Boston, New Bedford and Providence as prime sources for heroin and other substances. “There are people that are centered here on the Cape who are selling … but also we see people who are from off-Cape coming here, bringing it into our community.”

Wherever the heroin originates, the main goal is to keep it off local streets. “When we hear people say, ‘Jeez, you can’t find heroin anywhere,’ we know we’re doing our job,” said Lundegren, adding that the YPD goes out of its way to help those addicted to heroin and other drugs, hosting support groups for family members, and running the Proactive Anti-Crime unit, which concentrates many of its efforts on connecting addicts with treatment.

But police have no sympathy for those supplying the drugs. “If you’re a drug dealer in this town, you’re going to meet the drug enforcement team of the Yarmouth Police Department; we’re coming,” Lundegren said. “The town of Yarmouth has no room for drug dealers. Period. That’s an absolute.”